Brisbane 2032 Games infrastructure oversight plan

MAYORS, state and federal ministers will all have a voice at the table for Brisbane 2032 Games’s powerful co-ordination office, which itself will be “accountable to the parliament”.

It can now be revealed that co-ordination office, and the Olympic infrastructure office, will report to a specially formed “leaders forum”, made up of representatives from state, federal and local government.

But Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk will keep a firm hand on the wheel, chairing the forum, which has oversight of the co-ordination office within her own department.

Also invited to the forum will be two federal ministers, the mayors of Brisbane, Gold and Sunshine Coasts, as well as a representative from the South East Queensland Council of Mayors and Organising Committee for the Olympic Games president Andrew Liveris will join.

It is a move to increase transparency just five days after the state government revealed it had walked away from setting up an independent Games infrastructure authority, originally intended to have joint state and federal oversight.

Instead, it pledged to set up the Olympic co-ordination office inside the Premier’s department, with a separate Olympics infrastructure Office, within Deputy Premier Steven Miles’s responsibility.

The co-ordination office will be headed by Regional Development Department director-general Graham Fraine.

Ms Palaszczuk defended locating the co-ordination office within her own department, saying it was more efficient and pointed to a specially commissioned Deloitte report found this arrangement would avoid bureaucratic double-ups.

“It cuts red tape while, at the same time, provides input from all of our Games partners,” she said. The co-ordination office will be accountable to the parliament, which an external and independent oversight authority would not, according to the Deloitte report.